Proust Clothbound Box Hardcover – International Edition, September 7, 2017

The three volumes are beautiful. The author is one of the greatest, second only to Victor Hugo. I recommend it highly. I hope some day Penguin Classics will come out with the works of Victor Hugo in the same format as the Proust books.

Beatifull books

A most unusual work by a most unusual writer, a writer’s writer. This Penguin Clothbound edition is the first translation by C. K. Scott Moncrieff published in the 1920’s. This is a good start if one intends to read through all three major versions of this classic English translation one by one. Proust’s sentences in this work are very long, often running to more than 8 to 10 lines, but he is not verbose in that the thoroughness of the ideas he intends to convey justifies the complexity of the sentence structures. Writing a hundred years ago, Proust anticipated what neuroscientific findings in recent decades about how humans perceive the world. This work should be the acme of the psychological novel. As someone who has watched Downtown Abbey before reading this work, I find the descriptions of what modernity and technology did to people a hundred years ago most thought-provoking and most relevant to our own times. What aeroplanes and telegraph did to mankind a century ago is exactly like what the I.T. Revolution is doing to us today. One can’t help but be shocked. Although there are occasional typos, this Penguin Clothbound edition is a most elegant hardcover set worthy of prime of place on one’s bookshelves, if not prime of place by one’s bedside.

There have been several translations of Proust, many building on and revising earlier editions - and arguably each one an improvement on the last - so why go back to the first translation? Partly because it's got claims to be a work of literature in its own right. Scott Moncrieff gave Proust a languid, Edwardian, English voice, which isn't that close to Proust's own style, but for decades it was how English readers first encountered him. Not the most accurate translation in all cases, and not based on the best text, but worth having. Be careful when ordering, though, and check the picture to be sure - this is the Penguin Clothbound Classics edition, in 4 volumes with jewel-coloured bindings. Penguin Classics (note the difference) also publish a Proust translation (which it's easy to argue is a more accurate translation) in 6 paperback volumes. You may find collecting Proust translations is addictive.

Thoroughly absorbing. Found it easy to get hooked and I didn't think I would. You need time to sit down and just go for it - this is not train reading, possibly plane reading if the seat's very comfortable & you are going very long haul. Takes concentration.

I love the books. Thank you

It was was what was expected! We knew the work just wanted our own set